In the Washington region and across the country, the number of government-backed business incubators and accelerators has grown as public officials look for ways to support entrepreneurs, spur innovation and bolster their local economies.

Momentum is building in Washington to finally fix the country’s patent system, but the good guys better hurry. While Sen. Clare McCaskill, who has decried patent troll “bottom feeders,” moved to fast-track a reform bill this week, the trolls have been busy too. The most pernicious of them, Intellectual Ventures, has started a PAC and could succeed in neutering real reform before Congress scatters to campaign for the mid-terms.

As the Wisconsin Legislature rolls toward a spring wrap-up of its work, economic development items on its agenda range from protecting intellectual property from “patent trolls” to setting the stage for more classified research to rethinking the state’s sore-thumb tax on capital raised by many young companies.

It’s all part of a trend, not only in Wisconsin but nationwide, where most state governments are paying attention to what makes the tech-based economy tick.

A faculty group in Kansas is fighting for intellectual property rights on inventions that university employees create off campus. The Kansas chapter of the American Association of University Professors is trying to persuade the Kansas Legislature that it's in the state's interest to ensure faculty retain the right to patent technology they develop on their own time.

South Korea’s President Park Geun-Hye recently championed her strategy for a “creative economy” in a keynote address at the World Economic Forum in Davos. At the heart of her initiative is a focus on innovation and entrepreneurship. She believes the country’s current economic model has reached its limits. To boost growth and employment, South Korea needs to foster an ecosystem to support startups.